No wonder that new purposes and aspirations were born every hour in that woman's heart, impregnated by his manliness of quality. Yet each drew through the subtle texture of soul a different hue of life, as in a bed of flowers, from the same sunlight, one draws crimson, another azure, as though conscious of the harmony of complement and difference.
“I feel a rich, deep vein of thought to-night,” said Beatrice, “as though I could write a poem or a book, so vivid are my thoughts.”
“Your life has been a poem, full of sweetly blended words. You have lived yours out, while others have written theirs.”
“But there is such power in books, Basil.”
“I know it well. 'Some books are drenched sands on which a great soul's wealth lies all in heaps, like a wrecked argosy.' And some are sweet and full of passion-tones, and you feel on every leaf that you are turning, as though their heart-beats were going into yours; that they were dying that you might have life. Books are indeed great, but lives are greater; lives that are full of earnest purpose, and that fail not, even though the tide beats strong about them and the heavens hang thick and dark with clouds. The greatest poems are true lives, now surging with grief and passion, now pulsing with joy-notes, thrilling on each page of life. Some books, as well as persons, make us feel as though we stood in the presence of a king, while some give us tears. Some books and some beings dome us like a sky. Sister, you are the dome which ever overarches my life,—if day, with its azure and ermine clouds; if night, with its stars. Nay, do not write a book, but breathe and live your life out each day.”
“Yet I know that you, Basil, could write one, and make it full and perfect.”
“I could make one full of words, if not of thought; but come, the night is passing, we shall scarce have an hour's rest before sunrise.”
“Indeed, I think we are in a fair way to see its early brightness.”
To their dreams and life we will leave them awhile, knowing that to such hearts will ever come peace, whether sleeping or waking.
Past midnight, that silent hour when the earth is peopled with other forms. It is the hour for the brain to receive the most subtle influences, whether sleeping or waking.